Farmers are fed up with 2000 nuisance pigs whose ancestors first landed on
Flinders Island in 1877

Farmers and wildlife officers on the island have shot more than 400 pigs in the last six months but have struggled to control the populationPhoto: Alamy

By Jonathan Pearlman, Sidney

10:38AM GMT 29 Jan 2014

Australian farmers have called for the cull of a destructive colony of wild pigs, whose ancestors are thought to have been stranded on Flinders Island in 1877 when the ship they were on was wrecked on its shores.

Over the course of 150 years the pigs have multiplied to a population of around 2000, wreaking havoc on Flinders’ farmland and national parks, prompting calls for their eradication. The wild pigs have destroyed coastal reserves and angered farmers on the 40-mile-long island, north-east of Tasmania, south-east Australlia.

“Let’s get rid of these pigs,” a farmer, James Luddington, told ABC News. “It is an island. They can’t swim away anywhere.”

Farmers and wildlife officers on the island have shot more than 400 pigs in the last six months but have struggled to control the population.

The pigs are believed to have landed on the island after the shipwreck of a vessel named City of Foo Chow, which had sailed from London to Sydney and was heading for Calcutta when it landed on Flinders. Subsequent settlers on the island may also have introduced pigs.

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“Feral pigs are the descendants of domestic pigs, which were first brought into Australia by early European colonists,” says the Tasmanian government’s listing of invasive species. “These domestic pigs were often allowed to range freely to forage for food in the bush, and inevitably some became feral, living and breeding in the wild.”

Locals have begun urging the government to eradicate the pigs at a cost of about £1.1 million ($AUS2 million). The federal government knocked back an earlier application last year.

“It’s amazing how much a pig can dig up,” said Mr Luddington, a livestock farmer. “They’re cloven-hoofed and carry similar diseases that can threaten livestock populations, which is very important to us with the lamb and the beef. We should be able to get rid of them.”